1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to compact disc players and, more specifically, to a method of enhanced data compression rate for a compact disc player.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recorded media is now generally available in a newer format of a digitally encoded optical disc. An audio disc is commonly referred to as a compact disc (CD). Similarly, a player of a compact disc is referred to as a CD player. The CD player reproduces an audio signal from the digital data stored on the CD as is known in the art. Multi-disc CD players are capable of storing a plurality of CDs for selection and playback. The increasing popularity of CD players in recent years has expanded their use as an audio component on a vehicle, and in particular, a motor vehicle.
A disadvantage of a CD player is its susceptibility to shock. A shock or vibration can cause an optical pick-up in the CD player to skip over some of the data encoded on the CD, resulting in a transient interruption of the audio signal. For example, a motor vehicle experiences a wide range of driving conditions, including bumpy roads. The resulting vibration of the motor vehicle from a bump in the road can cause the CD player to skip. In the past, mechanical dampers have been added to the CD player to reduce its susceptibility to shock. Another technique is to first retrieve the data from the CD at a faster rate than normal and store it in a buffer memory. The position of the data is checked within the buffer memory to detect a skip and the skip is masked out. The data is retrieved out of the buffer memory at a typical play rate. While these methods have worked well in the past for occasional shocks or vibrations, they are not as effective, if road conditions are poor, since buffer memory space is limited and an overflow can occur. Thus, there is a need in the art for a method of enhanced data compression rate to improve audio CD performance under degraded road conditions.